Advocates for Justice, a New York based public interest law firm, has filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of East Ramapo School District parents and students. A motion has been filed by the defendants to dismiss the lawsuit, and Judge Cathy Seibel will issue her decision on Monday.

Why is D’Agostino still working for the District 3 months after the Board said they would get another attorney?

Why are children sitting 2 to a desk?

Why are there segregated Special Ed Kindergarten Classes in Yiddish?

4) East Ramapo Gambles on Budgets

Letter by Stephen Price, Former Board Member of East Ramapo
published in the Journal News (Sept 22)

Re: “East Ramapo’s aid issues will spread,” Sept. 5th Letter:

Regarding the Gap Elimination Adjustment Law, the letter writer missed an important point setting East Ramapo apart from all other Rockland school districts. Even if the GAP elimination law is repealed, there is no amount of increased state aid that will help East Ramapo as long as schools Superintendent Joel Klein and the Board of Education are allowed to continue to overspend their revenues as they have the past two years. This practice has accelerated the financial and educational demise of East Ramapo.

In his response to the recent comptroller’s audit, Dr. Klein stated, “We anticipate that within the next three years, the district will no longer require ‘one time revenue’ sources to bridge the gaps in the district budget.” Dr. Klein implies there are financial controls in place. But the recent history of mid-year program cuts demonstrates a profound lack of adequate planning. More realistically, Dr. Klein’s response is nothing more than a euphemism for a plan to continue deficit spending.

After the board recently cut more than $3 million from the voter-approved budget, it became apparent the distict’s response to the comptroller’s audit is an ominous foretelling of a dark financial future for East Ramapo.

This year, the district is gambling on almost $12 million in questionable revenue and budget assumptions. If these gambles do not pay off, the results will be more program cuts and more program cuts and more excuses to sell off the district’s assets.

Emilia White has won the Democratic Primary for Spring Valley Village Trustee!

Emilia was our candidate for East Ramapo School Board in 2009. She is married to Steven White, editor of this e-newsletter. Emilia has become well known for standing up to bullying from the school board presidents.

Emilia stood out from a crowded field of candidates earning 40% more votes than the next highest vote getter. Those who wish to congratulate her or help with the campaign for the Nov 5th General Election can contact her at happykcc@hotmail.com

What happens in local elections does affect our situation in the schools. It is important for us all to go out and vote. To vote in a party primary election, you need to be a member of that party.

Two candidates in local elections in this year’s Democratic Primary have actively supported our candidates for school board over the years:

Emilia White (Spring Valley Trustee) Emilia was our candidate for East Ramapo School Board in 2009. She is married to Steven White, editor of this e-newsletter. Emilia has become well known for standing up to bullying from the school board presidents.

Rita Louie (Haverstraw Town Supervisor) Rita has taken responsibility for our door-to-door campaign in her neighborhood several times.

One candidate this year has been part of the opposition to our movement. Dan Friedman worked for the local paper which notoriously published its view that “the board needs to be accountable to (private schools) first.”

Convicted pedophile still teaching at non-public school in East Ramapo

Unregistered non-public schools are failing children

Message from the editor

1) Slumlords on the School Board?

The president of the East Ramapo school board has made the news for owning an illegal boarding house in Spring Valley. The property is reported for lacking working smoke detectors, construction without a permit, and occupancy of uninhabitable space in the basement.

This is not the first time a school board member has made the news for unethical activity. In 2010, a school board member was cited by the health department for an illegal boarding house with occupancy of uninhabitable space and violations that were considered life threatening. Children (presumably East Ramapo students) were living in the building.

Both school board members were using the same property manager, who manages many properties throughout East Ramapo. The fact that many properties are unsafe and overcrowded has been common knowledge for many years. The Journal News has recently done a blistering series of articles on reckless real estate profiteering that is putting school children, among others, at risk:

The DA calls a plea bargain for probation “an appropriate way to keep control of this individual”, but in the next clip, students reveal he remains in the classroom!

4) Unregistered non-public schools are failing children:

This article in The Jewish Daily Forward includes riveting audio by graduates of East Ramapo non-public schools whose diplomas are not recognized by colleges. One characterizes his education there as “a pretend education” and “a fraud”. Your tax dollars subsidize services to those schools.

The above four articles may seem unrelated, but there is one common string connecting them: the bloc vote. It is hard to imagine a school board member in any other district being re-elected after being exposed as a slumlord. It happens in East Ramapo because of the bloc vote. It is amazing that a convicted pedophile should receive a deal that has resulted in him being able to continue to work with children. Those protecting the pedophiles by intimidating victims control large blocs of votes. The control of these voters is made possible by the East Ramapo school district, which decades ago made a deal to look the other way as thousands of children in unregistered schools are denied their right to an education, in return for some temporary relief from the bloc vote. If you come to the forum today, and you get to ask a question, perhaps it should be if the candidate has made any deals for votes?